SPIRIT OF SONG 



A 
Subjective Poem 




BY 



Dr. L. E. Holmes 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



A 



Subjective Poem 



BY 



Dr. I>in. EiV-^HOLMES 



Boston, Mass., .1901 






''It is He that hath made its and not we ourselves T 

Gift 

- (Person) 
^Mg" '05 



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TABLE OF CONTENTS 

Les Garnitures des Vers . . . . ii, iv 

Preface ........ v 

To Omar Khayyam vii 

Spirit of Song . 1-17 

Notes . . . .' 18, 19 



In memory s web there is no strand 

That holds like pure affection. Naught 
Can set the signet-seal or brand 

On the yonng hearty that Love has wrought 
When first Jie flew across the land 

Of Careless Houi's^ whose roses caugJit 
His perfumed breath and sighed upon his hand. 



PREFACE 

These few stanzas of verse are not published with the ex- 
pectation of applause or even as a first step that might lead to 
literary fame ; but that the author might leave them as a 
memento among many friends and very delightful acquaintances 
he has made in New England during a recent visit there, as one 
leaves a card on the hall table when departing. The ''card " has 
been too hastily prepared for one of its nature, but it is natural 
to trust much to the generosity of friends, and I leave this 
with them who have contributed to my intellectual and social 
pleasures during this all too short stay in their midst this 
winter of 1900-01, expecting each to read with gentle favor as 
one reads the message of a friend. The thoughts contained 
herein are the common heritage of mankind. There is much 
one feels that is not defined. To define a feeling or feelings 
common to all men has been the object of the writer however 
illy the task has been performed. The gems remain the same 
however much the polish is lacking. That every one should 
recognize them as their own would be the highest praise the 
author could ask. 

One of my newly acquired acquaintances, and one whose 
opinion in matters of this kind I prize highly, has very kindly 
written me, in anticipation of this publication, a letter which it 
affords me pleasure and satisfaction to introduce here : 

Dr. L. E. Holmes. 

My Dear Sir: In this poem you deal with matters that lie 
far back in the mysterious shadows that environ the visible 
every-day life. The path you follow is somewhat difficult for 
one not an expert in your special lore, but I can feel my way 



PREFACE 

along the track I can but dimly see. The matter of your poem 
is one that will never cease to interest and fascinate those who 
try to explore the wonderland of the soul. Your work is new in 
kind and in parts really beautiful, and the measure and move- 
ment of your lines seem set to a music that finely matches the 
somewhat sombre and mystic theme. Man, as an animal, sums 
up in himself the history of the whole animal world. If his 
body cells could remember and speak, they would, probably, re- 
hearse the experiences of sentient being from the first simple 
cell up to the present time. 

At what time mind began to share the experiences of the 
animal life, we cannot guess, but we must believe that the first 
thinking intelligence came upon the stage with a large heritage 
from his inarticulate past. How far that heritage enters into 
and influences the thought and feelings of the present must be 
left to conjecture, but it is safe to assume that the self-conscious 
life of the race is now more or less fully recovered in each in- 
dividual brain. Yet something in our nature that makes us feel 
akin to Nature in her wilder haunts will ever remain. One who 
remembers and reflects recalls the fact that in childhood, a 
beautiful sunset awakened emotions which the spectacle was not 
sufficient to explain. As manhood recalls the experiences of 
early years, so childhood tries to recall the things that came to 
it, shall I say, before childhood. To explain the emotions stirred 
by music, we must go beyond any remembered personal experi- 
ences. In poetry, we often hear a voice from beyond the horizon 
of the visible world, the exaltation of a joyful dawn, or the morn- 
ing of ages wondering and lost in personal night. 

The subject is of profound interest in verse or prose and I 
hope that you may find the time and mood, hereafter, to give it 
in verse a more extended and elaborate treatment. 

Sincerely yours, W. H. Savage. 
Hyde Park, Mass. 



VI 



To OMAR KHAYYAM 



The same old world, still tumbling ^mid the Spheres — 
The same old life, after the Thousand years — 

The same heart-yearnings and the same delights — 
The same red wine, and the same bitter tears I 

O Thotc PhilosopJier I what prescience thine ! 
The Lights thoit kijidled still our watch-fires shine ; 
Still dost thou lift from Sonvw her grim, shrond 
And for her gall pour out thy joyous wifte. 

Yes, still we tiLrn to Omars tented plain, 
And join, as he, the Reveler s moving train, 

Findy as he found, in song and ruddy botvl, 
Surcease . of Sorrow a7id relief from pain. 

^Tram indeed is gone with all his Rose.^ 

And Jamshyd^ s Sevn-ringd Cup where no one knows; 

But still a Ruby kindles in the Vine, 
And w,any a Garden by the Water blows'' 

For him, who sang this modern Rubaiyat, 

Old Omar Khayyam pozired a glass thereat ; — 

They both are Knights of lettered courtesy. 
But this One higher lifts his silkoi Hat. 

H. A. D. 



Yet more as a weird wind cries 
Humanly through a dark forest, 

My soul are the echo sighs 
Returning thou hearest. 



Spirit of Song 

DEDICATED TO MY FATHER'S SPIRIT 



'■'■Thy other name is grief. 
Or rather she^s thy 7notherP 

Hmc illae lacrymae. 

'■'I felt coming over 7ne a sad, sad longing like grief 
and I took a ream and -wrote ; and I only knew the 
■words I wrote but not their meanin(r,^OhD Proi'HESY. 



They say in the upper air 
A whisper soundeth far, 
And one can think they hear 
The breathing of a star. 

Oh, by what glowing embers 
Of this Immortal Day ; 
And by what finer members, 
Hear'st thou the Far-away? — 

Thou the Centuries marching 
Down thro' the vaulted spheres ? 
Thou, where skies are arching,' 
The footsteps of the Years ? 



I write. The words are mine. 
Wild grapes I give to thee ; 
O press them into wine, 
Dark as ^hy Mystery ! 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



Thou mov'st my ardent soul, 
(As if I made a vow) 
To write some rhythmed whole — 
Of what I know not now. 

Still under the gray embers 
No theme my vision gains ; 
Scarcely my soul remembers 
The throbbing of her pains. 

Stain me with blood and wine, 
The red wine of the heart ; 
And thy light that will shine 
After the days depart ; 

With the red light of Morning 
Before the day is due — 
All crimson is the awning ^ 
When the light shines through. 

From out the Soul-wrought Past, 
Low munnurs come and go, 
Like moanings of a vast, 
Unutterable woe. 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



Or like an afterthought, 
Down in the dells of doom, 
These silent walls have caught, 
Whispering in my room, ^ 

These murmurs go and come, — 
Dead whispers brought to me 
Out of the wrongs of some 
Depressed humanity. 

Mayhap, some earthly sorrow 
Has left a common wound. 
Whose scars have their to-morrow 
Like seeds cast in the ground: 

For Life's One Heart transmits 
Its joys, its grief, its crime — 
A vibrant chord, that sets 
The cadences of time. 

First when the loving God 
Thought Man, and, smiling, said — 
''Let there be Light,'' dull sod. 
Translated, bloomed and bled. 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



That blood forever flows 
Over the changing earth, 
Here blushes in the rose, 
There ofives a Caesar birth. 



fc>' 



God's Voice ! — Love heard its call, 
Impartial as the day ; 
Where'er its echoes fall 
Is human sympathy. 

And poetry must be. 
Expressed in every tongue, 
Life's conscious unity 
In Heaven and Nature sung: — 

A voice of pearly laughter, 
Low toned, as love would sing — 
A thought of the hereafter 
In bud and leaf of spring. 



Deep in the soul's recess. 
Pale Shapes like memories are. 
Inborn, that almost press 
The doors of thought ajar. 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



Likelines invisible 
That chemic lotions bring ; 
Or marks upon the wall, 
Where shades of pictures cling, 

These shadowy forms portray 
A lingering image here. 
Of those who passed away 
In the remotest year. 

— A New Soul, entered in. 
Knows not the empty tree. 
Till chemic touch akin 
Of life brings memory. 

If Genius comes, he burns 
The old ancestral ties — 
A torch of flame ! that turns 
But one bright light, and dies. - 

Grief's children ! ever near 
On life's continued stream ! 
Whose acts we feel and hear 
As mirrored in a dream. 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



Whose every deed, once sown, 
In pain, in woe, or mirth, 
Tho' ages far have flown, 
Will come again to earth ! 

Man's passioned heart dies not 
In Universal Whole; 
No deed is quite forgot, 
Descending with the soul. 

For knowledge has cell-form,^ 
Thought-wrought ; the form descends, 
A psychic instinct norm 
Whose light with reason blends. 

Thus spun, life's mystic thread 
Is evermore unwound, 
And all the ancient dead 
Are to the living bound. 

One crystal holds the whole 
Of all the cosmic past ; 
So in each jeweled Soul 
All shades of life are cast 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



The builder buildeth he — 
The lady weaves a spell — 
Their progeny shall be 
Good, as she weaveth well. 

All that the deep Sea stirs, 
Stained only as blood stains; 
All that was his or hers. 
Flows in my purple veins. 

Out of the fagots burned 
A vision lights the soul, 
And there's not else discerned '^ 
But the meaning of the whole. 

On the all-present ether 
Thought-waves from far away,^ 
To loving friends may breathe a 
Message in sympathy. 

Between the stars and love. 
Is still more finer air;^ 
Responsive hearts may move 
To psychic waves felt there. 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



I make my father's motion, — 
I speak again his voice; 
Far in Hfe's ebbing Ocean 
Anchored are the chains of choice 

The Dead they call us now, 
Out of a thousand years ; 
We lave their crimsoned brow 
In melody of tears ! 

Their breath is on the cell 
That breathes in song to-day ; — 
Their silent sorrows dwell 
In every soul-loved lay. 

Sweet music did begin 
In pain. See! in the art 
Of torture, curse, and sin, 
Grief has the rh3^thmic part. 

Done in the busy marts 
Of human toil and woe ; 
Beat in the troubled hearts 
That broke long years ago, — 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



Like souls descending now 
From far remorseless skies, 
They beat upon my brow 
Their pitiful, lingering cries. 

As if a soul would be 
Incarnate in a song, 
Their cries come up to me 
Out of the ghostly throng. — 

A flitting shadow seen 
Of unseen passer-by — 
A face on Memory's screen 
Of one in agony — 

A winding, weaving troop 
Of peopled images 
That in the darkness stoop 
In mincing mimicries; 

The toils of tortured men, 
Miraged on sky and sea, — 
Like battles fought again, 
They muster up to me. 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



Why blow the weird winds hither 
Against my broken lyre ? 
I raise my soul to gather 
The heart of their desire. 

They are the moaning cries 
Of souls, tho' buried long, 
All stained with crimson dyes, 
And unrequited wrong; 

For peace they come to me 
To urge their plaintive quest : 
I strike this harp to thee. 
And sing their souls to rest ! 

Gloomy the weary wind 
That blows funereal strain, 
Of murdered infant kind 
On Egypt's lowly plain ; 

The sea casts on the shore 

A thousand lives a day; 

The untempered winds slay more - 

Say, who can these allay ? 



10 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



Caught in creation's coil, 
Unknown the Where or Whence,— 
O sadder yet the toil 
Of man's incompetence ! 

Sweet melody, like flowers 
That hght the falling tear, 
Will sooth the restless powers 
Of spirits wandering here. 

I've seen a soul in grief 
Go sing that grief away ; 
I've heard the sweet relief 
Of music's melody. 

Sing, oh my harp, the peace 
These wandering spirits crave ! 
Sing! and the storm shall cease; 
Sing ! — it shall be thy slave. 

Sing ! and the laughing streams 
Will bless the plains below ; 
Sing of the brighter dreams 
Some other life may know ! 



II 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



God hath not heard His cry, 
Who called from Calvary's hill : 
We answer, we, who die 
Ascending Calvary still. 

The cup for mmi shall pass, 
Of sorrow, grief and tears ; — 
His answer comes — comes through 
An hundred thousand years : 

" Fair Art makes light the strain 
Over the earth's rough way, 
Ever with lessening pain 
The toils of yesterday T 

For Art perfects the 7iiission 
Of something Nature wrought — 
The hand's complete fruition 
In symdolizijtg thoughts 

'' All beauty is in functiofi 
To fullest Tneasure made — 
Heaven s supre^nest unction 
On Man and Nature laid!' 



12 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



y 



Men answer thus, like gods,^ 
The prayer that heaven denies, 
Making of earthly sods 
A bridge to Paradise. 

Oh, worldly knowledge, on ! ^ 
Thy heaven shall be more fair. 
Oh, glorious Art, new-born ! 
Thy work shall lessen care. 



Love, since the morning stars 
Forgot their sunburnt lay. 
Has Ht his silver bars 
Under the moon's soft ray. 

His borrowed Heavenly fire 
Gave Song immortal tone: 
Men strike th' enchanted lyre 
And think that sound their own. — 

But not the larks' pure joy — 

The song untaught by grief! 

Can man that note employ 

While chained on Time's rough reef.?* 



13 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



His voice can it, upsoaring, 
Full Heavenly song regain ? 
Can he, earth bound, be pouring 
Of joys untouched by pain ? 

Sometimes beyond control 
Of any mortal powers. 
Such quivers touch the soul 
In this low sphere of ours. 

Then bursts the heart in song ! 
Thus Shelley struck the lyre : 
'Twas joy's short dream ! Not long 
Could he burn Heaven's fire. 



In shells by India's sea, 
Rose-wrought by mollusk P'ay, 
In rhythm wearily. 
Souls breathe complaint, they say. 

When listening to the shells. 
You hear the great sea roar, 
Or tones like far-off bells 
On memory's dreamy shore. 



H 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



On Psychic Seas, strange wrought, 
Strewn on a blood-red shore,^ 
Are milk-white shells of thought. 
Of centuries before. 

And when you listen there. 
You hear God's whisper — " Nay. 
A thousand years they are 
To me as yesterday!' 

A thousand years each day 
Sees in the human soul ; 
A thousand years are they 
That make one human whole. 

The soul, down thro' the vast, 
Eternal years, has caught 
A thousand tones, recast 
In every human thought. 

And men will sigh and sing 
These echoes o'er and o'er ; 
Till on some softer string 
The chords are mellower. 



15 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



Thus Homer sang of old 
Of Priam's war-like seed; 
So sang a piper bold 
The Nibelungen Lied. 

But we, of life and love — 
The rhythm of the heart ; 
Some chord still far above 
May yet the truth impart. 

Still Pan is pastoral king, 
Be leaf or green or sear: 
Forever He will sing, 
For love abideth here. 

The generations go — 
The Past moves still along; 
Out of the jungle, woe, 
Upriseth the lark of song. 

And every wail of woe 
Re-set in song shall be, 
After the rivers flow 
Into the peaceful sea. 



i6 



SPIRIT OF SONG 



The tides will wash the bay 
Of every vile, dead thing ; 
Earth rhythms grief away 
In the lullaby of spring. 



The east grows light ! Now fades 
The muffle-footed train !; #-^ 
Now all the murmuring glades 
Forget their winter chain ! 

And I forget, O Grief ! 
The Sorrow, Toil and Pain, 
That sought for its relief 
This feeble, erring strain. 



Bozeman, Montana, March, 190: 



17 



NOTES 

^ [^Hear'st] thou the centuries marching, etc. — Sense impressions, 
of sound especially, may be, under kindred circumstances, repeated 
subjectively in the brain years after they were made, and are often so 
clear as to be taken objectively. The molecular changes made in the 
brain cells by sense impressions remain more or less permanently and 
constitute memory ; these physical changes are transmitted to progeny 
and are a physical memory called instinct. Some years ago the author 
of these notes was walking after midnight down a quiet street in a city 
and heard someone call his name twice quickly and run after him a few 
steps behind on the sidewalk. Turning quickly to see who called there 
was no one in sight ; then, after a moment, he remembered the voice — 
it was that of a friend who had died five years before. That puzzled 
him for a Httle, until he remembered also that that friend, just before 
his death, did run after him at that same place and, likely, at or near 
that same hour of night and did call him twice in that same hurried 
manner. It was the echo of the original call and footsteps, aroused by 
the hour and circumstances, to repeat itself subjectively in his brain, so 
that for a moment it seemed objective. May it not be, with the insane, 
who hear voices and fear men following them, that these subjective 
voices and thoughts in their brains are of cell impressions transmitted, 
perhaps, through several generations? — these voices and fears being 
but repetitions of what did occur to some remote ancestor. 

2 All ciimson is the [mental'] awning. — The color of thoughts is red. 
They either take this color from the red currents surrounding the gray 
brain cells or the psychic rhythm or wave corresponds to the vibrations 
of the red ray in the spectrum, i. e., about thirty-eight thousand to the 
linear inch. When one presses on the ball of the eye over the closed 
lids a red light appears — why red? Some papers were published, a 
few years since, upon the color of letters of the alphabet or on words, 
by writers of curious things, as if the for7n of the ink marks on paper 



NOTES 

would give different colors. If one could see in words such colors it 
would more likely be the thought expression contained therein and not 
the shape of the ink lines. Color wave in the psychic realm may have 
a finer vibration than in the physical, as that would seem a wave too 
long and slow for thought. A Harvard student, who was earning his 
way through college by exhibiting his powers to find objects hidden for 
the amusement of the curious public, and who, among other things, 
was able to place a common pin in a pin-hole in the wall paper of a 
room made in his absence and to do it with a quick stab from a dis- 
tance of two feet, which no man with his eyesight unobstructed could 
do without jabbing another hole in the paper, said to me, a few years 
since, in explanation of his abiUty to do this, that the hole in the paper 
made by the point of the pin looked red to him and about two inches 
in diameter, and that he could hardly miss it if he wanted to. 

3 The Form of the brain cell, created and developed by knowledge, 
is transmitted to the young and carries with it an instinct and readiness 
to receive Hke impressions that created it — an instinct that becomes a 
Light in aid of Reason and now and then creates a genius. 

4 The Past leaves somewhat of its meaning with the soul but nought 
or Httle, if any, of the incidents and experiences out of which that 
meaning was wrought. 

s Telepathy is beginning to be quite generally accepted as a fact. 

^ More finer air. — The air of affinity ; if that sympathy or attrac- 
tion between sensate or animate matter (as also between inanimate 
matter — between atoms and molecules) maybe called (or compared 
to) an air or ether between bodies. 

7 Milk white shells. — The white or gray brain cells are bathed in a 
sea of blood in the living brain and are descended in peculiar forms 
and with distinct traits through generations. 

^ The Present is ever the meaning of the Past. 



19 



THE HEINTZEMANN PRESS, BOSTON 



